


Whose bright idea was this?

by IronScript



Series: Voltron Drabble Collection [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: BAMF Lance (Voltron), Gen, Iverson realizes a few things, Lance has ADHD and depression, Lance is kidnapped, M/M, Post-season 7, Spoilers, but this really isn't langst, it just comes up at some point, so feel free to ignore it, the Klance is very subtle and pre-relationship, there is some angst for someone else though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-30 09:45:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15749187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IronScript/pseuds/IronScript
Summary: When Lance is captured during a mission with the MFE pilots, he wakes up aboard Haggar's ship, though the witch herself isn't there, so he figures why waste an opportunity? Then he finds something that he definitely hadn't expected.All the while, he has no idea that back at the Garrison, his team and a few select others are watching his every move.





	Whose bright idea was this?

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimers: As always, I am in no way affiliated with Voltron.
> 
> Enjoy! <3
> 
> Also, feel free to check out [My Store](https://www.etsy.com/shop/RayvnashesButtons)!

When the Paladins woke up and went to the mess hall for breakfast, it was to see Coran deep in discussion with Sam Holt, Commander Iverson, and Veronica McClain.

Immediately noticing the tense atmosphere surrounding the strange group, Pidge took it upon herself to go try and figure out what was going on.

Saddling up to the adults, she gave her dad a hug around his middle, pretending to still be half asleep.

“Morning, dad.” She gave a fake but convincing yawn, reaching up to rub her eyes. “Mum was wondering where you went.”

A lie, but one that made her uncharacteristic behavior more believable, not that anyone would’ve blamed her anyway, considering how the Galra had kept their family apart for so long.

“Ah, good morning, Katie.” Sam’s face softened as he looked at his daughter, though he certainly knew her well enough to know that the display of affection, while genuine, also had another motive. “Are you and the other Paladins ready for the day?”

Pidge hummed, glancing towards where the others the others were waiting for her. Hunk had grabbed her a plate, and he and Keith were both trying not to glance over at her too obviously, where Shiro and Allura had more luck looking natural, the princess casually asking about the offered food.

“Lance is a little later than usual, but I’m sure he’ll be here soon.” She said after a long moment, though she frowned slightly. “He usually has pretty predictable timing, though. If I had a watch, I could set it by his morning routine.”

She immediately noticed her father tense slightly, since her hands were still wrapped around his waist.

“Dad…” she looked up, concern and hesitation written on her face. “What’s going on?”

“W-we aren’t too sure yet.” He admitted with a pained grimace, before heaving a sigh. “Grab your friends—the ones already in the room, at least. You're all going to need to hear this.”

* * *

 

“Um, what are we doing here, and why aren’t we waiting for Lance?” Hunk whispered to the others as they were herded into a conference room.

“Because Lance is missing.” Veronica spoke up from where she was standing behind them, taking note of their reactions.

Hunk and Allura went pale, Shiro clenched his prosthetic fist, Pidge’s breath caught in her throat, and Keith froze completely, eyes locked on her.

“What do you mean Lance is _missing_?” Allura managed to get out, eyes wide in horror. “We saw him last night! Pidge and I dropped him off at the door to your family’s quarters on our way back from dinner.”

“We had asked him to go on a reconnaissance mission, off the books, to try and make sure an area was clear of Galran drones before we tried to branch out past the Garrison again.” Iverson said quietly. “Pilot Kinkade had glowing praises for McClain’s marksmanship, and from what the MFE pilots reported later on, it was a damn good thing he was there to cover them, because the enemy had left booby-traps that they wouldn’t have otherwise noticed.”

“That doesn’t explain why you don’t know where he is.” Allura protested when Iverson trailed off for a moment, unsure how to continue.

“Or why he didn’t tell us he was going.” Pidge added.

“Or why you didn’t just have _all_ of us go, for that matter!” Keith practically snarled. “Voltron is formed by five lions for a reason. We work best as a team!”

Unbidden, a memory of their first real bonding moment came to the Black Paladin’s mind, and his heart clenched painfully. He tried to shake it off, knowing that his emotional turmoil had to wait. Lance needed them.

“It wasn’t up to me, and he didn’t know about the mission until after dinner.” Iverson raised his hands in surrender. “From what I heard from the higher ups he tried to stop at Captain Shirogane’s room to let him know, since it was on the way to the hangar.”

“Shit.” Shiro breathed out, closing his eyes. “I didn’t go back to my quarters until really late.”

Flashes of the small plaque he’d spent hours upon hours staring at, memories of better times running through his mind—

“And they likely wouldn’t have let him stop again to try and tell someone else, so he wouldn’t have had much choice.” Veronica grumbled with a scowl, having also been asleep at the time and unaware of what was going on until it was too late.

“Guys, we’re getting sidetracked here.” Hunk interrupted with a huff, uncharacteristically annoyed, though given the circumstances who could blame him? “What. Happened. To. Lance?”

Iverson tried to suppress the shiver at seeing the laser focus of the Paladins, all directed at him.

Damn it, couldn’t the higher ups have just waited until morning to send them off? Then maybe they wouldn’t be in this mess…

* * *

 

Lance came back into consciousness slowly.

He did his best not to change his breathing patterns, and kept his eyes closed for a few minutes as he just listened to what was going on around him, taking note of the low-pitched voices and tones that he’d come to associate with the Galran language, even though he was still too out of it to hear any distinct words.

“Blue Palad—sleeping—wait for her to—send the transmission—”

Luckily once his hearing came back to him (he vaguely remembered yet another explosion, and seriously, what was it with him and bombs?), he started to make out some of the words, appreciating the Castle’s library for their educational resources that had helped him learn the language.

Languages had always been a talent of his, after all, and he hadn’t liked not knowing what he was looking at whenever they boarded a Galran ship, so he’d taken it upon himself to learn. It had even come in handy on a few infiltration missions, which was a plus.

Still, he had kept this skill a secret, for the most part.

Keith was probably better at it than he was at this point anyway, and if not, they could contact Krolia or any of the other Blades if they needed translation help. It wasn’t usually necessary _anyway_ , considering how many species used translators, so he doubted it would ever come up with the others.

This was all irrelevant at the moment, though.

Because there was only one person ‘she’ could be, and without his team, Red, or even bayard (he didn’t want to alert his captives that he was aware by actually checking, but he couldn’t feel its familiar weight, so that didn’t bode well), Lance was kind of up the creek without a paddle.

Unless…

He took his time after that, putting together a mental map of the room. How many people were in the room with him? Where were they located? What were they doing? How often did the footsteps outside the room pass by for patrol, and how many at one time?

And then the stars aligned as he sensed one of the aliens come closer to administer something to him (he wasn’t sure what, but he also had no intention of finding out), just long enough after the last patrol that there shouldn’t be anyone around for a while…

Lance let out a blood-curling _scream_ , the loudest and most high-pitched he could manage, as his eyes shot open, and the shock was enough to catch the Galra by surprise as he twisted the nearest one’s arm, making the Galra inject himself with whatever he’d been about to use on Lance, before reaching for the firearm holstered to his side and quickly taking care of the other two before they could do more than snarl at him.

‘Idiots didn’t even bother to tie me down.’ Lance thought to himself with a roll of his eyes as he carefully got up from the table they’d put him on, wincing slightly as the wounds he presumed he had received from the explosion were aggravated by him movements.

* * *

 

Shortly after their initial debrief, they all (past and current Paladins, Coran, MFE fighters, Mr. and Mrs. Holt, Veronica, and Iverson) found themselves watching the screen that showed the room Lance had been held in, a connection that Pidge immediately hacked, blocking the enemy from seeing what was happening in there and putting a loop on video to hopefully keep them from noticing.

The Paladins had all wanted to head out immediately to rescue their friend and teammate, but they had been held back pretty forcefully by the others' insistence that they’d have a better chance if they knew what they were getting into.

Keith (and, let’s be honest, the rest of them) had been ready to say fuck it and leave anyway, but Shiro had pointed out that they couldn’t form Voltron until Lance was back. Keith might still be able to fly Red in Lance’s stead, but then there wouldn’t be anyone to fly Black, since Shiro himself had to stay on the Atlas, since the gem powering his arm was what gave the ship power.

They had hated waiting, but were forced to admit that they were legitimate reasons.

But that didn’t make seeing their friend unconscious on some dirty table and surrounded by the enemy any easier to watch.

“What is that?!” Hunk panicked at seeing one of the aliens prepare a needle, clearly about to inject Lance with something. “What are they about to do to him?!”

“No no no—” Allura whispered under her breath, eyes wide in terror as her mind ran through everything she could think of that might be in that syringe.

“I—it _looks_ like it’s merely a strong sedative.” Coran said hesitantly, though the fact that he himself looked so unsure didn’t really help. “I don’t know how it would react to a human physiology, though…”

“Lance…” Pidge flinched back as she saw her friend let out a terrifying screech of what seemed to be pain, before calming the slightest bit, realizing that it had been a distraction.

“Holy fuck shit that’d do it!” Keith hissed loudly, grimacing in agony and clutching at his ears.

“Sorry.” Veronica said with a sheepish smile, though it did little to hide the terror she felt for her youngest sibling. “Being loud and distracting has always been Lance’s go-to. And he’s had vocal training, so his range is higher than most.”

“I wouldn’t have guessed.” Keith groaned, eyes clenched tightly shut, while some of the others focused less on his grumbling and more on the ‘vocal training’ thing, wondering why Lance would’ve needed it.

“Paladins, be quiet!” Shiro hissed quietly, eyes having never left the screen as he watched Lance get himself out of the room, carefully closing the doors and ensuring that no one would realize that anything was amiss. “Pidge, can you follow him?”

“On it!” she nodded immediately and would’ve saluted if not for the fact that she needed her hands to hack into the other cams as soon as possible.

“Similar layout to Lotor’s ship, at least, so he’ll have a general idea of where to go.” Pidge rambled as she went, once again taking everything over so that the Galra couldn’t track Lance’s location.

Her hunch was proven correct when Lance made his way over to a door that opened up to show a full-fledged armory, where he wasted no time grabbing his armor, bayard, and a pair of small daggers, both of which he quickly hid in his boot just in case.

“Wait, the hangar should be the other way.” Hunk jolted as Lance exited the armory and took a left.

* * *

 

“Come on, come on…” Lance muttered to himself, feeling paranoid as he tried to navigate the first console he could find, quickly infecting the system with a code Pidge had written (which he’d only known because he was there when she created it) that would give her an in if she hadn’t already found the ship.

That wasn’t his biggest priority, though.

There was a reason he’d been sent on an information gathering mission, and as Coran could confirm, since the Paladins had been asked to fill out mission reports each day back at the Castle, Lance was nothing if not thorough when it came to this kind of thing.

Step 1: Check for any non-Galrans held on the ship.

Step 2: Check for any Galran _Blades_ on the ship.

Step 3: Check for information on the missing Altean colony Romelle had called home.

The first two were pretty standard, but the Coalition had put out a lot of feelers when the strange Robeast thing was found to have been powered to an Altean. It was hardly a mystery of who had the resources to create such a thing, and if he was on her ship anyway, he might as well find out as much as he could.

Luckily there didn’t seem to be any Blades aboard, but the scan for non-Galra did pull up something.

Obviously Lance would have shown up in the search, but the other result also appeared to be human…

* * *

 

“Smart.” Leifsdottir commented quietly, eyes scanning the screen constantly for anything that might be able to help them extract the Red (Blue uniform should equal Blue Lion, it didn’t make any _sense_!) Paladin, though privately she wondered if he wasn’t capable of escaping on his own.

He’d certainly saved her team during the mission in which he’d gotten captured, and he seemed to be avoiding the Galran patrols just fine, always ducking out of sight moments before someone came into view.

“Lance used to sneak around the Garrison every night.” The big one, Hunk, said, apparently on a similar wavelength to her.

“Every night?” Iverson looked taken aback, unimpaired eye wide with shock. “We only caught him a few times…”

“Yeah, his success rate is a lot higher than you probably assumed.” Hunk admitted sheepishly, though he conversely also looked proud of his friend. “He’d memorize the patrol schedule, routes, had alternate routes planned in case of something unexpected, figured out suitable hiding places even big enough for me, on the rare occasions he could talk me into joining him…”

“But the security cameras—" Pidge frowned. “I mean, when I snuck around I just hacked them so no one would notice, but how did Lance get around them?”

“Well, I mean, they weren’t stationary, so he’d just time it perfectly.” Hunk shrugged.

“Oh, so number three already had experience sneaking around military bases, did he?” Coran laughed. “No wonder he always seemed to have an easier time of it than the rest of you.”

“Coran!” Princess Allura admonished, nudging her advisor with her elbow.

“Why do you call him number three?“ Rizavi asked curiously.

“By height, of course.” Leifsdottir hummed to herself as she ticked them off on her fingers. “Captain Shirogane, the Yellow Paladin, the Red Paladin in blue armor, the Black Paladin in red armor, the princess, and then the Green Paladin.”

“Bingo!” Coran confirmed, snapping his fingers in her direction. “Number four became number three for a while after the ‘aging two years on the back of a space whale’ incident, but then Lance had another growth spurt.”

“Why do you call him by name instead of number more often than the others?” Iverson asked.

“Because he’s my/Coran’s favorite.” All of the Castle’s former residents answered in unison.

“Er, except for the princess, of course. I’ve known her since she was born, after all.” Coran coughed, though he otherwise looked totally unabashed at his apparent transparency, though to be fair none of them seemed to mind.

The others wondered if there was a story behind that.

“And since he’d never call Allura by her number, I get to keep my designation as number 5.” Pidge added blankly, giving Coran a peace sign as his eyebrow twitched at the inaccuracy.

“Guys, this isn’t the time.” Keith breathed out, eyes wide. His eyes, like Shiro’s, hadn’t wavered from the screen even once despite keeping track of the conversation going on around him.

“Shiro?” Pidge frowned as she realized that her friend had frozen in shock, eyes wide and slightly glazed over. “What’s going on?”

“Oh my god.” Shiro gasped as his lungs realized that they hadn’t gotten any oxygen in far too long.

“What, what’s going—” Sam maneuvered himself to be able to see better before his own eyes widened, quickly darting from the new figure on the screen to Shiro, and then back again. “Oh…”

* * *

 

The tank was mocking him, the form of someone who Lance had only seen around the Garrison a few times but never directly spoken with looking back at him.

Figuratively, that is.

Because Adam Waite was _alive,_ albeit unconscious.

Lance’s breathing hitched as he realized what must have happened.

Haggar had held Shiro for _months_ , and they already knew from the whole Kuron thing that she must have invaded his mind during his initial captivity.

Adam was such an important figure in Shiro’s life, so much that they had been contemplating getting engaged prior to the Kerberos mission, so of course it made sense that he would feature prominently in Shiro’s memories.

And if she had realized somehow that he was piloting one of the ships that Admiral Sanda had so foolishly sent out to meet the Galra when they first arrived, then it wasn’t too outside of the realm of possibility that she would be able to nab him without anyone realizing.

It would’ve been a very safe assumption that he was dead, considering how he’d gone offline with a loud explosion in the background, and especially since none of the pilots’ bodies had never been recovered, a retrieval mission having been far too much of a risk at the time…

Oh god…Shiro was hurting so, so _much_ for this man, now that they’d had a chance to fucking _breathe_ , and the former Paladin had already had so much taken away from him.

And Lance…Lance wasn’t going to stand by and watch Shiro lose yet another part of himself to the witch.

“We need to get you out of here.” He said quietly, blue eyes taking on a determined glint. “I can’t speak for Shiro, but I imagine it was pretty shitty coming back after so long only to find out that you were supposedly dead.”

* * *

 

Veronica gave a low whistle. “You know, I don’t think I’ve _ever_ heard my brother curse.”

“Never?” Pidge raised an eyebrow. “Not even once?”

“I mean, one time in second grade he showed a friend an injury on his finger and the kid went to the teacher to tell on him for using his middle finger, and that’s how he found out that it was a thing, but never intentionally.” She admitted, a few of the Paladins smiling at the story, though Allura and Coran didn’t get what was so bad about a finger. After all, humans were born with ten, why wouldn’t they be able to use some of them? “I think he actually made a vow not to when Sylvio and Nadia were born.”

“I think the universe will forgive him.” Keith grunted, reaching out to put a hand on Shiro’s shoulder in support, knowing how much this must be affecting him.

He couldn’t bring himself to actually look away from Lance, but since Shiro’s own eyes were also glued to the screen he couldn’t feel too bad about it.

“Am I the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on?” Hunk asked awkwardly, only for Allura, Coran, and Pidge to display their own bewilderment. “Oh, good. As long as it’s not just me.”

“That would be Adam Waite.” Sam Holt offered quietly, glancing at Shiro with sympathetic eyes. “I’d rather not say more…”

“Go ahead.” Shiro said blankly, clearly suppressing some strong emotions as he waved his prosthetic in Sam’s general direction.

“Shiro and Adam were together.” Colleen said, ruffling her daughter’s short hair gently. “Adam was thought to have been killed when the invasion started, because the late Admiral Sanda didn’t trust Sam’s word that our regular jets weren’t enough, but as we can see, his death was greatly exaggerated.”

Shiro choked on a laugh. Leave it to Colleen Holt to manage to manage that kind of delivery.

“I was going to propose before leaving for the Kerberos mission, but before I had the chance, Adam gave me an ultimatum.” Shiro croaked. “Either follow our dream of being together by staying or go fulfill my life-long dream by taking the mission.”

“What the hell.” Pidge bit out.

“There were…circumstances.” Shiro flinched. “Don’t judge him too harshly, please. Keith?”

He didn’t want to explain said circumstances, which Keith figured was fair. “Shiro used to have a medical condition, back before the transfer to the clone’s body gave him back his health. He wouldn’t have been able to pilot for very much longer.”

And that was all he felt comfortable saying about that without Shiro’s expressed permission.

“I wonder if Lance knows that.” Allura said after a long silence where no one quite new what to say. Most of the Paladins were reeling, having had no idea about Shiro’s medical issues, but it felt redundant to push the issue now that he was in a healthy body.

“He knows there was something up.” Veronica confirmed. “I remember that he’d noticed your medical bracelet. Our abuela had one, so he’d seen them before and knew what kind of thing would require one. I think it probably made him look up to you more, actually. That you would work so hard to reach your dreams even when your own body is working against you.”

Shiro’s lips quirked up in a small, fond smile.

At first he’d thought the whole admiration thing was just because he was a good pilot, but he’d come to realize over time that that was only part of it. That Lance had known of what he’d once considered his greatest shame and so wholeheartedly accepted him for it was very comforting to know. It was no wonder his clone had chosen Lance to try and reach out for help from, and of course Shiro himself had specifically tried to get Lance’s attention in the astral plane back then, though he considered it his own fault the other boy hadn’t been able to hear him, since he’d waited too long and had been drained of energy at that point.

Hunk, for his part, flinched at the reminder that Lance himself struggled with both ADHD and depression. How could he have forgotten that? Sure, they might’ve had a hard time lately, but this was his best friend’s _health_.

Iverson flinched too, though no one noticed.

Part of the reason he’d been so harsh with the cadet was because he knew about the mental issues that plagued him (it had to be included in his file since he had a few prescriptions for it) and was trying to get the kid to drop out before he ended up somewhere he had no access to medicine that could help him.

He had been pretty cruel about it, he had to admit as a sharp pang of regret ran through him, and McClain seemed to be doing a damn good job as one of the ‘defenders of the universe’, medication or not. He eyed Coran, hoping they’d be able to figure something out for when the teens inevitably went back to space.

Shirogane and Kogane had already gotten their apologies, and when McClain got back (‘if’ he got back, his traitorous mind whispered), Iverson fully intended to continue the trend.

* * *

 

In the end, the Paladins hadn’t even had to really do anything aside from Pidge, since Lance had had everything well in hand, taking Adam with him into an escape pod that Pidge used her hacking skills to ensure Haggar’s ship couldn’t track. By uploading Pidge’s virus he’d also acquired her access to all of the information held on the ship, one of which would later give them a lead to the lost Altean colony.

For now, though, they were just glad to have Lance back, and of course Adam as well. The older pilot wasn’t yet awake, but Shiro had quietly slipped away and could be found at his former lover’s bedside until the other regained consciousness.

Veronica had to be bribed into not telling their family that Lance had been kidnapped in the middle of the night when none of them had even realized he’d gone somewhere, but eventually he managed to convince her that he was perfectly fine, and he didn’t want them to worry even more.

After a few hours of debriefing and a Paladin cuddle pile with Lance at the center, the team wanting to make sure that he really was safe with them, Iverson quietly pulled him aside to offer a surprisingly sincere apology, congratulating him for becoming such a great hero despite those who had tried to pull him down.

Lance, like Keith, offered a handshake, a smile, and a newfound understanding of each other.

Considering Lance hadn’t heard about Keith’s own reunion with Iverson, the others would’ve found it hilarious that he had basically acted the exact same way.

For all their differences, in some ways they were eerily alike. No wonder they worked so well together.

Now they just had to get both of them to admit it.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you guys liked it, feel free to leave a comment! :D
> 
> The story about Lance accidentally using the middle finger was taken straight from my own childhood. -_- It's always fun getting in trouble for doing something you didn't know you were doing.


End file.
